Lost
by Houndmon
Summary: One-shot about baby Ash and his father getting lost in Cerulean City. Guess who they meet.


**Hey everybody! I'm sorry I haven't updated, but I hit a writer's block. My two current stories should be updated by the end of the week. **

**This is a one-shot about Ash and Richard from my story Brothers. Richard is Ash's dad if you didn't/don't want to read Brothers. This happens about two weeks before that story. **

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"Do you see your mother?" I asked my five year old son. Ash sat on my shoulders with one of his little hands wrapped around my forehead and the other gripped on his newly acquired Official Pokemon League hat, which was on his head.

"Nope nope, Daddy." He told me switching his grip so he now had a fistful of my hair. "I see no mommy anywhere." I sighed in part-way defeat. Ash and I were with Delia Christmas shopping in Cerulean for once, because Ash wanted to get his hat himself and I didn't want to be alone, or cleaning. Then we got separated from her. One moment we were in a clothing store with Delia going 'Oh look, a sale!' every five minutes or so, then Ash pointed out a battle showing on TV and we are transfixed. When I think the battle is almost over, I look around for Delia. The crowd all the sudden got huge and we were lost. So here we are now, outside the mall in the middle of Christmas shopping season, yelling and looking for Delia.

"Let's keep looking," I sighed. We walked over to our car where we parked, which it was a miracle I remembered, where there was no Delia.

"Mommy was here." Ash told me in his baby voice.

"How can you tell?"

"There are bags in my chair." I looked in the window of the back seat and saw he was right, inside the car was twelve or thirteen shopping bags stuffed in to the backseat. I shuddered at the thought of how many were in the trunk of our Honda Sonata.

I sighed again. "Let's go over to the park," I said pointing across the street. I felt Ash nod excitedly as I took a small piece of paper and one of those foldable pens out of my pocket to write a note to Delia. I had learned on my journey to keep some paper and a pen or pencil in my pocket in case I needed it, it saved my life once. So after leaving a note for Delia, we headed across the street to where the park was.

"Down now, please," Ash said while kicking my collarbone lightly. I laughed and put him down on the ground.

"Go play. I'll be sitting on that bench looking for Mommy." Ash nodded and headed towards the swing set, where there was an empty one. I sat the bench and let my gaze wonder, searching for my wife.

"Daddy! Lookie me!" My gaze quickly turned to my son and my hand flew to Spark's pokeball. Ash was calmly swinging in the swing, rather high. "I'm flying, Daddy!" I let out a breath I didn't know I was holding. I just kept having this sinking feeling that something was about to happen soon, and us getting lost just increased my paranoia.

"That's great," I answered. "Why don't you play in the sandbox?" 'Then you can't give me a heart attack.' I added silently. Ash nodded, skidded to a stop, and ran over to the sandbox. I returned to my quest of searching for my wife.

"Excuse me sir." I turned to face a young blonde lady about her early teens. "Is, like, this seat taken?" I shook my head and mentally rolled my eyes. "Like, thank you sir. Are you, like, looking for someone?"

"Actually, yes I am," I said, raising my eyebrow suspiciously. "My son and I got separated from my wife in the mall." Her bright green eyes lit up in excitement.

"That's, like, my favorite place!" I cleared my throat to get her back on track. "Oh right, your wife. Does she, like, come here often?"

"Yeah, she comes here to do her major shopping and to watch some water show every week or so," I said waving my hand around like it didn't matter, which it didn't to me.

"OMG! Your wife is, like, a regular to our show?" She practically screamed in my face. "I'm, like, Daisy Waterflower. I'm one of the Sensational Sisters that run the water shows here. Maybe I know her, I, like, always talk to some of the audience members after the shows."

I sighed. The last thing I wanted to do is to give away my name, someone might still remember me as the guy who almost beat Lance. "Her name is Delia." I choked out.

"Like, Delia what? There are a bunch of women named Delia who come to our show."

"Delia Ketchum," I said softly, not that I wasn't talking softly to begin with.

"I, like, so know her!" Daisy yelled again. I rolled my eyes and sneaked a glance at Ash while Daisy was talking about Delia having season tickets. Ash was attempting, and failing, to build a sand castle. I smiled and went back to 'listening' to what Daisy was saying. I was starting to pride myself on tuning out women once they got in their 'talking to a brick wall' mode, as Professor Oak called it. "… and she, like, talks about how you don't, like, clean much."

"Wait, what?" I said turning my attention back to the Sensational Sister. "I do too clean the house. I'm just not allowed to clean the kitchen anymore."

"Yeah, like, right," She said laughing. I was going to defend myself again when I heard Ash crying.

"Daddy!" He cried, running straight into my lap. "She pushed me!" He yelled pointing at a red-haired girl about the same age.

"Misty!" Daisy yelled. "Did you, like, push this little boy?" Misty stomped over to where we were.

"Un-uh, he took my shovel and pail first." Misty told us with a little lisp.

Ash buried his head in my chest and whimpered from his spot on my lap. "It looked like mine from home," Ash told me. "It was an Ac-c-dent."

"Did you tell her that?" I asked, pulling him off my lap. He shook his head and started sniffing. "Then tell her."

"Sorry. I didn't mean to take your stuff." Ash said softly.

"It's alright," Misty told him. "I'm sorry for pushing you."

Daisy looked at me wide-eyed. "You are, like, good with kids. It, like, takes me and my sisters forever to get Misty to, like, apologize."

"That's why Delia keeps me around," I said smiling.

"Richard Ketchum!" '_Speak of the devil'_ I thought. I turned around quickly to the voice of my wife, who was coming from the only spot I can't see from the park bench, go figure.

"Honey," I said meekly. I knew that when she yelled my full name, I was in trouble. She was like the mother I never had. I put Ash on the ground who went instantly to his mother's side.

"Hi Ash sweetie. How long have you two been here?"

"Looong time. I had fun on swings, Mommy," Ash told Delia, as he was lifted into her arms. I learned a long time ago to let Ash calm down her rage/depression/whatever when we were in public places; I can do it on my own at home.

"I left you a note on the car. Didn't you get it?" I asked, curious on why she was so mad.

Delia kissed Ash. "That's why I came over here. Of course all I could read was the word 'park'." She pulled out the note from her pocket and handed it to me. She was right though, I do have Sparrow-scratch handwriting. "And didn't I tell the two of you to wait by the electronics? Did you think I would leave you there?"

"Well," I said scratching the back of my head. "You know how I get around a good battle." She looked at me with that 'Yes… and?' look. Luckily for me, she looked at Delia at that exact moment.

"Oh hi Daisy! How have you been?" Delia said, forgetting that she was mad at me. Enter the patented 'Talk to Brick Wall' mode, so much for my paranoia. Ash wiggled out of his mother's arms and ran over to me. He tugged on my shirt and I knelt down to his level.

"Let's get lost more often, Daddy. I had fun." I laughed and he ran off to play with Misty. He is going to be a great man and trainer one day, and I'll be there to help him along the way. _ 'Yep,' _I thought sitting back on the bench. _'Life is good.'_

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_**Ok so here it is. If you like these one-shots then tell me by review! or if you want more of them or have an idea for little Ash and Daddy then tell me that in a review too. If you want to flame, go ahead. I'll just hand it to Flame, Richard's shiny Charziard.**

**So review! **


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